today was a long day. we went with a few people from our program to these salt mines outside of krakow. the salt mines were basically just like underground caves where people used to and still mine salt. we went down like 100 flights of stairs to go to these caves and it kinda felt like the movie, journey to the center of the earth, but without brendan frasiers' hilarious witty asides. bummer. we thought it was gonna be tight but it wasnt that great. we had a tour guide who spoke in english but she kinda weirded me out cause she had the same hairstyle as david bowie circa 1981. and she also sounded like a polish robot with a really eerie tone. so monesplye just kicked it in the caboose of the tour with a tiny asian family. because i was too far away to hear the guide, i created my own tour in my head. it went something like this:
these mines used to be the ancient gypsy kingdom of gypsytania (JIP-SEE-TAY-NEE-A). gypsys kept to their own down there until WalMart decided to buy the mines for 3 dollars (equivalent to 3 trillion in gypsy currency) and turned it into a money-making tourism spot.
a few nights ago we went out with some people from work and as ben mentioned in his previous post, the place we were at turned out to be a gay bar/club. one of these girls had friends from germany there and we were chillen with them for a while. i was talking to this hot german girl named hannah and she told me that she lived in lexington, kentucky for a year and has been to GATLINBERG. how absurd is that? literally the last place on earth i would have expected her to say. she was being a tease the whole night, especially on the dance floor, but as the night came to a close i noticed that her and her other german friend were closer than the average BFFAEAE's. i think it was the way they snuggled on the couch, passionately sharing a cigarette and embracing each other to the fullest that made me realize that they were lezzing out.
this was the night that we were staying with the people from work so my bag was at the hostel and the only clothes i had were plaid shorts, a city sports t-shirt, vandy sweatshirt and sneakers. i looked like the biggest idiot at this place. just imagine me sitting and dancing at this pretty gay bar in that attire. the freakin bouncers made me lift up my sweatshirt when i got in because he mustve thought i was packing heat under my vandy hoodie. as you could guess, no gays hit on me :(
right before we left, a friend of the girls we worked with (who happened to be blacked out) sat next to me on a couch and told me to take advantage of being an american in poland as long as i didnt hurt anyone. i have no fucking clue what this broad was talking about. did i really look threatening in my t-shirt and plaid shorts? she then rambled on about her fiance and how she was in love with him but questioned his sexual selection and violence. i just sat there and nodded my head cause i had no idea what was going on.
work is still really fun. i thoroughly enjoy hanging out with these kids. they are funny and really friendly and even though we dont speak the same language, it still really feels like we are making a strong connection with them. monesplye feels positive about the experience. i like chillen in the art room with some of the girls and making clay animals. its like sex and the city meets the babysitters club meets daddy day care. we just like sit and like gossip about the boys.
i will leave you with another observation i have made here. it seems to be that in krakow and many other places in europe i imagine that people say the best food can be found in these hole in the wall places that look like prison dining halls. the food is good but that is the exact opposite as the united states, or at least nyc. those places in nyc probly serve rat meat instead of chicken. so im going to stay positive and not think the same applies here.
until next time bloggers. you stay classy.
-stb
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Friday, May 29, 2009
The First Weekend Begins...
Right now I'm lying in my bed at the hostel drinking a Mirinda (orange soda) and vodka out of a glass coffee cup. We just finished dinner at this weird polish place and now we are just challen before we hit the town. MoneSplye has been in Krakow for about a week, and it has been BALLIN to say the least. The bars here are very ridiculous, it's like there's a different one every where you look. A lot of the bars are underground, so there are these weird cavernous passageways and all the rooms are candle lit. Every bar tries to put a different spin on being underground, whether it's with the music or funky decor. Anyway, what we been doing for the last few days:
On thursday we ended up going back to our youth center at night and handing out food to a bunch of poor people. We gave out a lot of jelly, I don't really know why. After that, as Splye noted in the previous post, we went to go stay with these girls who we work with, one from Finland and one from Latvia. So it was MoneSplye and Sanjay heading to these girls apartment after work. We met their roommates, Polish hicks who were studying in the city "at university." We spent the majority of our time sitting around this rickety table teaching them English slang. Their favorite words were "chilling" "tight" and "sick." They ate that shit up, laughing like Sean Penn in "I Am Sam." Then the night got weird.... So we end up going to this bar with these girls, and it seemed a little weird. The entire time one of the girls kept saying that Spencer was "serious" and "scary." I've never heard someone describe SP as scary, I think they might have just not known what that meant. Anyway, we get dragged to the dance floor to dance to terrible 80s music, mixed with some good Michael Jackson. Suddenly, something seems weird to me. I can't put my finger on it. It's kind of like that feeling when you walk in a room, and something smells bad, but not bad enough that you can say something about it, especially because it could be someone around you. Instead, you just wonder to yourself, and when you figure it out, you might be inclined to say something. So I stopped dancing, and sat down on this red velvet couch to observe. To my right, there are these two guys dancing on a stage that has a pole in the center. One of them is jumping up and down like a horse and the other one is doing something that resembles throwing a lasso. In front of me, these shoeless whores wearing what look like panchos are stomping around and waving their arms in a wild fashion. On the couch to my left, there are these two relatively attractive girls with their arms around eachother, sharing a cig in a really weird way. oh. my. god. It hit me. We were in a gay bar! So I asked the girl, "is this a gay bar" and she simply said, "yes, all six levels of this bar are gay." MoneSplye had never been to a gay bar before, but hey, we're in europe.
So the night ended with us sleeping on the floor of these girls room. This crazy cat kept leaping all over us, but I threw some of my gypsy dust on it. Initially, the girl asked us to sleep with the light on, and then MoneSplye said something to the effect of "this isn't the underground railroad" and then she eventually came to her senses. I slept pretty well, considering it was on the floor.
Anyway, the last funny thing that happened was this morning. So we were on the bus to work and then this crazy lady stands up and starts screaming at the bus. When I say yelling I mean it sounded like she was hacking up a loogie, throwing up and screaming at the top of her lungs at the same time. She has to be like 75 and she's carrying around a jar of booze. Yes, a jar of booze. At 10am. I think it was a mix of red wine, bleach, dirt, crushed Claritin and red pepper from the way this crazy old slut smelled. She took an empty bag of potato chips from this little kid and stuffed it in her bag. MoneSplye thought that was the final ingredient she needed for her special human stew. Anyway, she comes up to us and starts yelling at our Indian roommate, saying god knows what. She kept bumping into splye, which was hilarious because of how disgusted he looked. Suddenly, she grabbed Splye by the wrist and thrust a finger in his face and started screaming at him. At that point I grabbed my blackberry out of my pocket and knocked the bitch in the back of the head. She crumpled to the floor, in a pool of her own blood as her jar of booze exploded on the floor. The whole bus started to cheer! They patted Splye on the back and they all pitched in to give me the equivalent of $82 american. I felt like a god.
just kidding about the hitting the bitch in the head part, we got off the bus before she could assault us further.
oh yeah, some kid told me that his only dream was to go to the US and see the statue of liberty. then he said that he would never go because it would take 4 months of his parents wages to pay for the flight alone. it def struck a chord with MoneSplye, certainly quite humbling. we'll hit you up in a few days, wish us luck tonight!!
love,
Benjamin
On thursday we ended up going back to our youth center at night and handing out food to a bunch of poor people. We gave out a lot of jelly, I don't really know why. After that, as Splye noted in the previous post, we went to go stay with these girls who we work with, one from Finland and one from Latvia. So it was MoneSplye and Sanjay heading to these girls apartment after work. We met their roommates, Polish hicks who were studying in the city "at university." We spent the majority of our time sitting around this rickety table teaching them English slang. Their favorite words were "chilling" "tight" and "sick." They ate that shit up, laughing like Sean Penn in "I Am Sam." Then the night got weird.... So we end up going to this bar with these girls, and it seemed a little weird. The entire time one of the girls kept saying that Spencer was "serious" and "scary." I've never heard someone describe SP as scary, I think they might have just not known what that meant. Anyway, we get dragged to the dance floor to dance to terrible 80s music, mixed with some good Michael Jackson. Suddenly, something seems weird to me. I can't put my finger on it. It's kind of like that feeling when you walk in a room, and something smells bad, but not bad enough that you can say something about it, especially because it could be someone around you. Instead, you just wonder to yourself, and when you figure it out, you might be inclined to say something. So I stopped dancing, and sat down on this red velvet couch to observe. To my right, there are these two guys dancing on a stage that has a pole in the center. One of them is jumping up and down like a horse and the other one is doing something that resembles throwing a lasso. In front of me, these shoeless whores wearing what look like panchos are stomping around and waving their arms in a wild fashion. On the couch to my left, there are these two relatively attractive girls with their arms around eachother, sharing a cig in a really weird way. oh. my. god. It hit me. We were in a gay bar! So I asked the girl, "is this a gay bar" and she simply said, "yes, all six levels of this bar are gay." MoneSplye had never been to a gay bar before, but hey, we're in europe.
So the night ended with us sleeping on the floor of these girls room. This crazy cat kept leaping all over us, but I threw some of my gypsy dust on it. Initially, the girl asked us to sleep with the light on, and then MoneSplye said something to the effect of "this isn't the underground railroad" and then she eventually came to her senses. I slept pretty well, considering it was on the floor.
Anyway, the last funny thing that happened was this morning. So we were on the bus to work and then this crazy lady stands up and starts screaming at the bus. When I say yelling I mean it sounded like she was hacking up a loogie, throwing up and screaming at the top of her lungs at the same time. She has to be like 75 and she's carrying around a jar of booze. Yes, a jar of booze. At 10am. I think it was a mix of red wine, bleach, dirt, crushed Claritin and red pepper from the way this crazy old slut smelled. She took an empty bag of potato chips from this little kid and stuffed it in her bag. MoneSplye thought that was the final ingredient she needed for her special human stew. Anyway, she comes up to us and starts yelling at our Indian roommate, saying god knows what. She kept bumping into splye, which was hilarious because of how disgusted he looked. Suddenly, she grabbed Splye by the wrist and thrust a finger in his face and started screaming at him. At that point I grabbed my blackberry out of my pocket and knocked the bitch in the back of the head. She crumpled to the floor, in a pool of her own blood as her jar of booze exploded on the floor. The whole bus started to cheer! They patted Splye on the back and they all pitched in to give me the equivalent of $82 american. I felt like a god.
just kidding about the hitting the bitch in the head part, we got off the bus before she could assault us further.
oh yeah, some kid told me that his only dream was to go to the US and see the statue of liberty. then he said that he would never go because it would take 4 months of his parents wages to pay for the flight alone. it def struck a chord with MoneSplye, certainly quite humbling. we'll hit you up in a few days, wish us luck tonight!!
love,
Benjamin
Thursday, May 28, 2009
The Quiet Before the Storm
it rained here yesterday. SPOILER ALERT: contrary to popular beliefs, gypsys do not melt in the rain. its like they adapted to our climate and are taking the characteristics of human beings. spooky!
last night was an extremely fun night. we went to this bar/club which was really trendy and fun. throughout my nights here ive noticed 2 major differences between european men and american men:
1. if you can dance really well here, you are the man and will most likely grind-dance with a plethora of hot chicks all night long. in the states, if you can shake it, people probly think your gay.
2. dudes here with bob marley hair that is nappy and long get hot dames. american dudes with that hair are thought of as dirty and smelly hippies by most females.
there were these two girls at the club last night dressed extremely sluttily and were unreal dancers. the way these girls shaked their hips was fantastic. it was as if they were functioning as two seperate halfs: the bottom half wiggling around in a glorious way and the top half just like looking smokin hot and seductive. it seemed like these two girls worked for the club and just got dudes excited to dance and they would leave them in the dust. ben begged to differ but i bet he thinks strippers like him too.
there were these girls we were kinda dancing with that kind of asked us to come back to chill at their spot. one of the three refused cause "she had a boyfriend". i think it turned out to be better for us because i usually do not enjoy waking up in a bathtub full of ice with my kidney missing. but that might just be me.
as our first week is slowly but surely coming to an end, i have begun to miss many things about america. i miss watching the mets, i miss understanding at least 2.54% of the things that are going on and said around me, i miss driving and not taking a loopy tram systems to get anywhere, and i miss not being stressed out when ordering food at a restaurant.
we were kicked out of our hostel for tonight because it was overbooked so we are staying with these two girls we work with. i think that i can trust them but you can never be too sure if you will see the sunrise when sleeping on the couch of finnish and latvian chicas (although the sunrise does occur at 430 am which is nuts).
thats it for now. i guess ill see ya when i see ya.
peace, love & gap
-splyderman
last night was an extremely fun night. we went to this bar/club which was really trendy and fun. throughout my nights here ive noticed 2 major differences between european men and american men:
1. if you can dance really well here, you are the man and will most likely grind-dance with a plethora of hot chicks all night long. in the states, if you can shake it, people probly think your gay.
2. dudes here with bob marley hair that is nappy and long get hot dames. american dudes with that hair are thought of as dirty and smelly hippies by most females.
there were these two girls at the club last night dressed extremely sluttily and were unreal dancers. the way these girls shaked their hips was fantastic. it was as if they were functioning as two seperate halfs: the bottom half wiggling around in a glorious way and the top half just like looking smokin hot and seductive. it seemed like these two girls worked for the club and just got dudes excited to dance and they would leave them in the dust. ben begged to differ but i bet he thinks strippers like him too.
there were these girls we were kinda dancing with that kind of asked us to come back to chill at their spot. one of the three refused cause "she had a boyfriend". i think it turned out to be better for us because i usually do not enjoy waking up in a bathtub full of ice with my kidney missing. but that might just be me.
as our first week is slowly but surely coming to an end, i have begun to miss many things about america. i miss watching the mets, i miss understanding at least 2.54% of the things that are going on and said around me, i miss driving and not taking a loopy tram systems to get anywhere, and i miss not being stressed out when ordering food at a restaurant.
we were kicked out of our hostel for tonight because it was overbooked so we are staying with these two girls we work with. i think that i can trust them but you can never be too sure if you will see the sunrise when sleeping on the couch of finnish and latvian chicas (although the sunrise does occur at 430 am which is nuts).
thats it for now. i guess ill see ya when i see ya.
peace, love & gap
-splyderman
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Day 4: It's Quiet, Too Quiet
Amigos:
Today was the second day of working with the kids. So far, shit has been very chill and interesting. As Splye noted, we are working outside of Krakow at this youth club for at risk chidrenz. As soon as you get a half mile outside of Krakow, the scenery completely changes. Krakow is essentially a medieval city with a bunch of old, pastel buildings that are bunched up on half asphalt half cobblestone streets. Yet as soon as you leave the city limits, low lying buildings and churches turn into rolling hills, marshes and open pasture. It's very green there, a lot like the American Northwest. There are a few houses here and there, but by and large it's just farmland.
The kids that we are working with are pretty fucking hilarious. Our job is essentially to show these kids what the rest of the world is like. Because they are generally poor, most of them will apparently never leave an area within five square miles of the place they were born. Definitely weird to think about when I just travelled like 7,000 miles--I'm a lucky SOB. None the less, the kids are high spirited. The philosophy of the youth center is to let them basically do whatever they want, as long as they're not blowing lines, beating their wives, drinking antifreeze, etc. It makes sense, these kids don't want to be regulated with an orderly schedule, it makes them feel like they're in school. Like SP said, they spend most of their time playing this weird online game called Tibia. The best way I can describe it is a mix of Zelda and Oregon Trail, vs other people. I tried to explain that the Tibia is a bone in your leg, but the kids just kept saying "ladybomb" or some shit back to me in Polish. None of them speak English, and the few that do can only say shit like, "I like a sport, you american, I am grandpa." So basically, I have a license to say whatever I want to them, because frankly, they cant understand me. Today, one of the bully kids pulled my chair out from under me when I sat down. I got punked, and since I'm ultra competitive and fairly childish, I told him that I could steal his lunch money and throw him down a well and he wouldn't be able to get me because I would simply go back to the US and they would not extradite me. He smiled and high fived me. USA 1, Gypsy Polak 0.
The kids are great though, they love us. We shoot the shit with them all day, barely understanding each other but we are def communicating in a weird way. We also play this crude form of Rugby, where MoneSplye basically runs down a field with a small football, tossing it back and forth while these little polaks try to tackle us. It's tight cuz they make me feel like Godzilla, reigning down a fiery terror of athletic dominance. I learned that the ball fake is strictly an American phenomenon--more on this later. Some of them are stupidly athletic--as SP said there's this one kid who we call Ocho Cinco who was crazy hands and probably a 40" vertical....he's only 12. I want to get him on a workout routine and nutrition plan and bring him back to the US, rename him Hancock Shuttlesworth and get him signed in the NFL or NBA. He would def fit in my suitcase--I never have to work again (ladies--this means I will be loaded and able to supply you with caviar, diamond studded Fiji Water Bottles, and paintings for our house like that Monet water lillies and the Mona Lisa).
We went out last night to some sketchy bar that is frequented by Polaks and drank weak beer. We warmed up with some $9/ a handle Polish vodka which went down smooth and didn't quit. After that we hit this bar where beer was 90 cents and they were blaring 80s music I never heard before. Suddenly, this song came on. Think about the combination of cheap beer, polish vodka, and this song from Scarface. Needless to say, I was told I could be doing the shopping cart dance, which looks something like this. Anyway--shit is going down in krakow.
I've started rushing all these young, poor polish kids into aepi. They said they heard it was a sick frat. I asked if they liked Carnival or Anything But Clothes more, and they just high fived me. word.
lakers in 6, Magic in 7 --> lakers in 5....
peace out, keep checkin every two days for updates, pics comin soon....
B
Today was the second day of working with the kids. So far, shit has been very chill and interesting. As Splye noted, we are working outside of Krakow at this youth club for at risk chidrenz. As soon as you get a half mile outside of Krakow, the scenery completely changes. Krakow is essentially a medieval city with a bunch of old, pastel buildings that are bunched up on half asphalt half cobblestone streets. Yet as soon as you leave the city limits, low lying buildings and churches turn into rolling hills, marshes and open pasture. It's very green there, a lot like the American Northwest. There are a few houses here and there, but by and large it's just farmland.
The kids that we are working with are pretty fucking hilarious. Our job is essentially to show these kids what the rest of the world is like. Because they are generally poor, most of them will apparently never leave an area within five square miles of the place they were born. Definitely weird to think about when I just travelled like 7,000 miles--I'm a lucky SOB. None the less, the kids are high spirited. The philosophy of the youth center is to let them basically do whatever they want, as long as they're not blowing lines, beating their wives, drinking antifreeze, etc. It makes sense, these kids don't want to be regulated with an orderly schedule, it makes them feel like they're in school. Like SP said, they spend most of their time playing this weird online game called Tibia. The best way I can describe it is a mix of Zelda and Oregon Trail, vs other people. I tried to explain that the Tibia is a bone in your leg, but the kids just kept saying "ladybomb" or some shit back to me in Polish. None of them speak English, and the few that do can only say shit like, "I like a sport, you american, I am grandpa." So basically, I have a license to say whatever I want to them, because frankly, they cant understand me. Today, one of the bully kids pulled my chair out from under me when I sat down. I got punked, and since I'm ultra competitive and fairly childish, I told him that I could steal his lunch money and throw him down a well and he wouldn't be able to get me because I would simply go back to the US and they would not extradite me. He smiled and high fived me. USA 1, Gypsy Polak 0.
The kids are great though, they love us. We shoot the shit with them all day, barely understanding each other but we are def communicating in a weird way. We also play this crude form of Rugby, where MoneSplye basically runs down a field with a small football, tossing it back and forth while these little polaks try to tackle us. It's tight cuz they make me feel like Godzilla, reigning down a fiery terror of athletic dominance. I learned that the ball fake is strictly an American phenomenon--more on this later. Some of them are stupidly athletic--as SP said there's this one kid who we call Ocho Cinco who was crazy hands and probably a 40" vertical....he's only 12. I want to get him on a workout routine and nutrition plan and bring him back to the US, rename him Hancock Shuttlesworth and get him signed in the NFL or NBA. He would def fit in my suitcase--I never have to work again (ladies--this means I will be loaded and able to supply you with caviar, diamond studded Fiji Water Bottles, and paintings for our house like that Monet water lillies and the Mona Lisa).
We went out last night to some sketchy bar that is frequented by Polaks and drank weak beer. We warmed up with some $9/ a handle Polish vodka which went down smooth and didn't quit. After that we hit this bar where beer was 90 cents and they were blaring 80s music I never heard before. Suddenly, this song came on. Think about the combination of cheap beer, polish vodka, and this song from Scarface. Needless to say, I was told I could be doing the shopping cart dance, which looks something like this. Anyway--shit is going down in krakow.
I've started rushing all these young, poor polish kids into aepi. They said they heard it was a sick frat. I asked if they liked Carnival or Anything But Clothes more, and they just high fived me. word.
lakers in 6, Magic in 7 --> lakers in 5....
peace out, keep checkin every two days for updates, pics comin soon....
B
Whats ^ Dudes?
so our community service started the other day and it is a pretty hysterical situation. we basically just go to this after school club for gypsy children in the burbs of krakow, which are basically just glorious praires, and kick it with the kids and like try and speak to them in english. the kids are pretty funny and its a fun gig.
a typical conversation with a kid there goes:
-Spencer: what are you doing?
-Polish Child: da krak va mar tek sluch groo
-Spencer: huh?
-Polish Child: steeek var doop shlop vanmer
-Spencer: Oh! Sick!
there is a kid there damien, who we have deemed the leader of the children. we say this because he seems to be the best at the computer game they all play called Tibia. all they do is basically play that game. its truly bizarre. i guess its kinda like world of warcraft, only like 30 years behind in technological achievements. my favorite kid is Marchek or as ben and i call him "ocho-cinco". we call him this because he is very skilled at catching the football and for those of you who dont follow sports (girls and wiener ;) ocho cinco is chad johnson, a receiver on the cincinnatti bengals. i have considered taking ocho home with me and training him to be a stud athlete. we will see how realistic that is as time goes on. this one girl there loves us and she always does that like in-love-with-you sigh that reminds me that girl in billy madison who sends him the valentines day cards and waves at him with that cute hand-cupped wave. oddly enough, this girl looks exactly like that girl from that movie so ive made her start waving at me like that. shes 8 so thats cool too. haha, kidding, im not weird like that.
one of the most annoying things about krakow is that old gypsy women bother us when we are eating and bark at us in disgusting noises. being the sage traveler that he is, ben bought gypsy dust that he merely sprinkles on them when they are near so they cannot cast their diabolical spells on our perogis.
there are these two chicks that weve hung out with from this program we are on. one of them is from finland and the other is from latvia. we went out with them last night and they took us to "non-touristy" spots. what the fuck? we are tourists. so we left those places and went to this place called carpe diem while i awkwardly danced with them to "bille jean" and "hands up baby hands up". but they are all right besides the fact that they took me and ben to this lake after work today and basically made us tight rope around a 200 foot drop over a rocky death. luckily our nimbleness allowed us to prevail and survive another day in krakow.
thats it for now, im gonna give the comp to mones so he can spit some fire.
-S
a typical conversation with a kid there goes:
-Spencer: what are you doing?
-Polish Child: da krak va mar tek sluch groo
-Spencer: huh?
-Polish Child: steeek var doop shlop vanmer
-Spencer: Oh! Sick!
there is a kid there damien, who we have deemed the leader of the children. we say this because he seems to be the best at the computer game they all play called Tibia. all they do is basically play that game. its truly bizarre. i guess its kinda like world of warcraft, only like 30 years behind in technological achievements. my favorite kid is Marchek or as ben and i call him "ocho-cinco". we call him this because he is very skilled at catching the football and for those of you who dont follow sports (girls and wiener ;) ocho cinco is chad johnson, a receiver on the cincinnatti bengals. i have considered taking ocho home with me and training him to be a stud athlete. we will see how realistic that is as time goes on. this one girl there loves us and she always does that like in-love-with-you sigh that reminds me that girl in billy madison who sends him the valentines day cards and waves at him with that cute hand-cupped wave. oddly enough, this girl looks exactly like that girl from that movie so ive made her start waving at me like that. shes 8 so thats cool too. haha, kidding, im not weird like that.
one of the most annoying things about krakow is that old gypsy women bother us when we are eating and bark at us in disgusting noises. being the sage traveler that he is, ben bought gypsy dust that he merely sprinkles on them when they are near so they cannot cast their diabolical spells on our perogis.
there are these two chicks that weve hung out with from this program we are on. one of them is from finland and the other is from latvia. we went out with them last night and they took us to "non-touristy" spots. what the fuck? we are tourists. so we left those places and went to this place called carpe diem while i awkwardly danced with them to "bille jean" and "hands up baby hands up". but they are all right besides the fact that they took me and ben to this lake after work today and basically made us tight rope around a 200 foot drop over a rocky death. luckily our nimbleness allowed us to prevail and survive another day in krakow.
thats it for now, im gonna give the comp to mones so he can spit some fire.
-S
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Greetings from Poland!!!
when i was still in the best country in the world, i decided to get a massage at the airport. i felt pretty cool and the massage felt pretty good but this asian broad did something to my neck with her fingernails that no human could actually enjoy. i wanted to say something but i didnt because there was a hot girl sitting next to me getting a facial so i didnt want to seem like a pussy...but i was crying inside.
observations from the plane:
-the evil foreign male flight attendant yelled at me twice when i wudnt get a drink with my meals. i dont know why and i thought you had to be super friendly to be a flight attendant but this guy was just a jerk
-the devil wears prada is better with no sound (anne hathaway is a smokeshow...XTIAN barstoolsports.com wooo wooo)
-ambien changes lives
while sitting in the prague train station waiting for our train to krakow, i felt like i was in purgatory. it was a miserable place to say the least. we passed 5 hours of time watching small pickpocketers target people and go in for the kill. (jeff- i dont know how u spent a semester with those people in prague, granted i was only in the train station but the people there seemed miserable, i also dont know why im writing this because i know you are too lazy to read my blog, DICK). the train ride was miserable. i couldnt get comfortable and i couldnt fall asleep. i put my feet up on the seat and these butch haircutted lesbos yelled at me in some terrible sounding language. it sounded like they were witches casting a spell on me.
we went out when we got into krakow and had a very fun night. the first person i saw there looked exactly like kristen torrey and i thought it was gonna take more than crossing the atlantic ocean to escape her deadly wrath. we went to this tight bar that had a basement that was a dungeon. there were literally trap doors that sketchy polaks kept on disappearing into. oddly enough, people were grind-dancing to spanish techno and american hits such as "california dreamin" by the mammas and the papas.
today we went to the heart of krakow. it is actually a tight city. we went to this castle where there used to be a dragon that ate virgins. yes, it really seemed like people truthfully believe that fable and it weirds me out.
this other dude who is in this program with us is this kid sanjay from buffalo. hes the man and hes like the skipper and ben and i are gilligans. he knows his shit cause his girlfriend is from poland so he kinda leads the way....FOR NOW. hes teaching us polish sayings that are funnily enough the shit borat says. for example, yekshamesh-how are youu (i think) and jinkwiya (or however u spell it)- thank you. sanjay said polaks love when we speak their language but whenever i say anything in polish, the people look at me like im some kind of freak. they also dont say ur welcome back when i say thank you in polish, so fuck em, i aint conforming to their bullshit language.
well thats all for now, work starts tomorrow, hopefully some funny stuff will occur, hope everyone is dandy. mike/dan/pete/berger-drink an extra goombay smash for me in the bahamas.
yours truly,
spencer thomas blye
observations from the plane:
-the evil foreign male flight attendant yelled at me twice when i wudnt get a drink with my meals. i dont know why and i thought you had to be super friendly to be a flight attendant but this guy was just a jerk
-the devil wears prada is better with no sound (anne hathaway is a smokeshow...XTIAN barstoolsports.com wooo wooo)
-ambien changes lives
while sitting in the prague train station waiting for our train to krakow, i felt like i was in purgatory. it was a miserable place to say the least. we passed 5 hours of time watching small pickpocketers target people and go in for the kill. (jeff- i dont know how u spent a semester with those people in prague, granted i was only in the train station but the people there seemed miserable, i also dont know why im writing this because i know you are too lazy to read my blog, DICK). the train ride was miserable. i couldnt get comfortable and i couldnt fall asleep. i put my feet up on the seat and these butch haircutted lesbos yelled at me in some terrible sounding language. it sounded like they were witches casting a spell on me.
we went out when we got into krakow and had a very fun night. the first person i saw there looked exactly like kristen torrey and i thought it was gonna take more than crossing the atlantic ocean to escape her deadly wrath. we went to this tight bar that had a basement that was a dungeon. there were literally trap doors that sketchy polaks kept on disappearing into. oddly enough, people were grind-dancing to spanish techno and american hits such as "california dreamin" by the mammas and the papas.
today we went to the heart of krakow. it is actually a tight city. we went to this castle where there used to be a dragon that ate virgins. yes, it really seemed like people truthfully believe that fable and it weirds me out.
this other dude who is in this program with us is this kid sanjay from buffalo. hes the man and hes like the skipper and ben and i are gilligans. he knows his shit cause his girlfriend is from poland so he kinda leads the way....FOR NOW. hes teaching us polish sayings that are funnily enough the shit borat says. for example, yekshamesh-how are youu (i think) and jinkwiya (or however u spell it)- thank you. sanjay said polaks love when we speak their language but whenever i say anything in polish, the people look at me like im some kind of freak. they also dont say ur welcome back when i say thank you in polish, so fuck em, i aint conforming to their bullshit language.
well thats all for now, work starts tomorrow, hopefully some funny stuff will occur, hope everyone is dandy. mike/dan/pete/berger-drink an extra goombay smash for me in the bahamas.
yours truly,
spencer thomas blye
Day 2: Hysteria Sets In
Dear Internet,
Well, we safely made it to Krakow. After about fifteen hours of flying and seven hours of train travel, MoneSplye have settled in their hostel. The plane was chillin, I met this kid who went to ASU and we shot the shit for an hour or so before I fell asleep. He seemed generally uninterested in life and was spectacularly unfunny. Anyway, I landed in Prague and met Splye and we went to the train station without a hassle. The Prague train station defines miserable, to say the least. We had to spend four hours there, but it seemed like twenty. We spent most of the time sitting in this dilapidated park behind the train station next to a sleeping homeless dude and what I thought was a hooker. I'm not sure why I thought that, but I got that vibe that she was into getting paid for having sex. When we got on the train, we had our first cultural mishap! MoneSplye were lampcity in our cabin on our train, and Splye was reclined with his feet up. Suddenly, some little gremlin train conductor ran in the cabin and started yelling at Splye in czech. Obviously neither of us had any idea what the fuck she was talking about, until the woman in our cabin pointed at splye's reeboks and garbled the word, "feet." I guess you aren't supposed to put your feet on the opposite chair--but fuck that we is America, we get our double cheeseburgers for $1, we put our feet wherever we want. At this point MoneSplye decided that we loved America more than anywhere else because you can put your feet wherever you want, and gremlins don't exist because of the surplus water supply. So after 7 hours we got to Krakow--our hostel is Tiny House small, far from everything, but there's a liquor store adjacent. We're gonna try to get a new spot before we get sucked into the sinkhole that is probably going to force this building to crumble at any moment. We met our roommate, another kid who's doing the program with us, named Sanjay. We hit the bars with him and he was being the man. For some reason Splye thinks I'm gonna throw down with him at some point in Krakow, but I doubt it.
I've heard they love Americans here, but so far it seems the opposite. People look at us with a weird curiosity, and it kind of bugs me out. People also think they have the right to fuck with us, or so it seems. For instance, we don't speak Polish so we could barely order drinks last night, and at one bar we tried to get two beers. This bartender who looked like a coked out Chris Martin gave us two shots of beer, thinking he was hilarious. MoneSplye got pissed and tried to start a riot before Sanjay calmed us down. Somehow, in the confusion, Splye left the guy a big tip. We hit some spooky bars where they played a techno remix of Sinnerman by Nina Simone, which was tight. We walked around Krakow today, nothing that funny happened. Our program director told us about this dragon that used to live in Krakow, and she seemed thoroughly serious and truthful. I was skeptical. Also, we met this guy in our program who I believe is a pederast, but time will certainly tell.
We are probably going out tonight, but we are posted up so hard right now that it is hard to tell what's going to happen. I'm bout to pass Splye the mic, so listen up.
The Great Monesby
Well, we safely made it to Krakow. After about fifteen hours of flying and seven hours of train travel, MoneSplye have settled in their hostel. The plane was chillin, I met this kid who went to ASU and we shot the shit for an hour or so before I fell asleep. He seemed generally uninterested in life and was spectacularly unfunny. Anyway, I landed in Prague and met Splye and we went to the train station without a hassle. The Prague train station defines miserable, to say the least. We had to spend four hours there, but it seemed like twenty. We spent most of the time sitting in this dilapidated park behind the train station next to a sleeping homeless dude and what I thought was a hooker. I'm not sure why I thought that, but I got that vibe that she was into getting paid for having sex. When we got on the train, we had our first cultural mishap! MoneSplye were lampcity in our cabin on our train, and Splye was reclined with his feet up. Suddenly, some little gremlin train conductor ran in the cabin and started yelling at Splye in czech. Obviously neither of us had any idea what the fuck she was talking about, until the woman in our cabin pointed at splye's reeboks and garbled the word, "feet." I guess you aren't supposed to put your feet on the opposite chair--but fuck that we is America, we get our double cheeseburgers for $1, we put our feet wherever we want. At this point MoneSplye decided that we loved America more than anywhere else because you can put your feet wherever you want, and gremlins don't exist because of the surplus water supply. So after 7 hours we got to Krakow--our hostel is Tiny House small, far from everything, but there's a liquor store adjacent. We're gonna try to get a new spot before we get sucked into the sinkhole that is probably going to force this building to crumble at any moment. We met our roommate, another kid who's doing the program with us, named Sanjay. We hit the bars with him and he was being the man. For some reason Splye thinks I'm gonna throw down with him at some point in Krakow, but I doubt it.
I've heard they love Americans here, but so far it seems the opposite. People look at us with a weird curiosity, and it kind of bugs me out. People also think they have the right to fuck with us, or so it seems. For instance, we don't speak Polish so we could barely order drinks last night, and at one bar we tried to get two beers. This bartender who looked like a coked out Chris Martin gave us two shots of beer, thinking he was hilarious. MoneSplye got pissed and tried to start a riot before Sanjay calmed us down. Somehow, in the confusion, Splye left the guy a big tip. We hit some spooky bars where they played a techno remix of Sinnerman by Nina Simone, which was tight. We walked around Krakow today, nothing that funny happened. Our program director told us about this dragon that used to live in Krakow, and she seemed thoroughly serious and truthful. I was skeptical. Also, we met this guy in our program who I believe is a pederast, but time will certainly tell.
We are probably going out tonight, but we are posted up so hard right now that it is hard to tell what's going to happen. I'm bout to pass Splye the mic, so listen up.
The Great Monesby
Thursday, May 21, 2009
the night-before jitters
friends & foes alike,
id like to welcome you all to the infamous monesplye blog summer 2009. this is a very new experience for me. one, i have never been to europe and two, i have never blogged. i feel really trendy. kinda like brandon cohen trying to push his new screenplay at endeavor agency in LA.
i am not gonna lie, i am a little nervous for this eurotrip. as ben said so eloquently in his post, he has not had many interactions with the poles. my only experience with polaks is vince vaughn's character in the highly successful romantic comedy, the break-up. for some reason, i keep on thinking everyone in europe is going to have a dirty beard, smell bad and will yell at me in tongues i cannot understand. i hope that is not the case, but you win some and you lose some.
i really hope i can find myself over there. like what my purpose is in life. NOT. i love america. as some of you know, my favorite athletes are the american homegrown studs (i.e david wright). but i am def excited to see the different cultures and help these young naive polish kids learn about our western ways. hopefully i will be able to control my laughter when they ask ridiculous questions is stupid broken english.
well that is all from america, my next post will be made across the pond!!! i hope all of your summers are joyous and plentiful of happy times. if you are bored at work or just really miss the cooky antics of me and mones, check out our blog. hopefully it will bring a little joy to all of your days. take care.
-splye and demand
The Introduction
Yo Internet, what up?
Whether you are reading this blog because you are bored at work/summer internship, because you're tired of espn/tmz/stumble/random youtube videos, or because you just plain care about MoneSplye, welcome!
A wise friend once told me that it is tough to keep an interesting travel blog. Basically, it is pretty unpopular to write something like, "today I went to this museum, then we ate at this cafe, then we missed this bus, etc." So, with that being said, I'm going to try to keep the posts fresh and full of funny stories.
For those of you who don't know, Splye and I are traveling in Europe over the next month. We will be spending the majority of our time in Krakow, Poland doing community service with a group called the AlfKlub. Around June 15, we're meeting up with All American Tom in Florence; then moving as a tripod to Switzerland, Germany and the Czech Republic. I've never travelled unsupervised in Europe, and I'm pumped to say the least. At the same time, I'm pretty unsure of what to expect. My only interaction with Poland has been The Wire Season 2 and a principal's office trip in fourth grade when I got in a heated argument with a Polish exchange student. At the AlfKlub we are going to be working with kids who are 7-17, teaching them conversational English and basically westernizing them. We're going on field trips with them and going to their homes and such. I think that a lot of funny shit is going to happen at work -- I can't really imagine how some of these young kids view America.
A few things that I've been thinking about leading up to the trip: what's the food like? Do they like Americans? Will I stop coughing after the trip? Am I going to be able to watch the rest of the NBA Playoffs? Was pole dancing invented in Poland? Am I in a highly stylized version of the Truman Show? I'll try to answer these questions throughout the blog...
I know the last question is pretty irrelevant, but it's certainly possible. I'll keep this post relatively short, nothing funny has happened yet. We leave tomorrow morning. I'm pretty much packed; I still gotta put some shit on my iPod but it ain't no thang.
As a semiprofessional hater, I know that there are going to be plenty of haters out there. Especially people who have already been abroad -- I'm sure you're going to say, "pshh, why do I need to read this? I've already been abroad, I've been to all the places he's talking about. MoneSplye is a stupid idiot anyway, I hate them for no reason!" To you, fellow haters, I would like to quote the great Mike Tyson and extend to you the following: just turn off the station.
See you mothafuckas in Europe...
-Ben
Whether you are reading this blog because you are bored at work/summer internship, because you're tired of espn/tmz/stumble/random youtube videos, or because you just plain care about MoneSplye, welcome!
A wise friend once told me that it is tough to keep an interesting travel blog. Basically, it is pretty unpopular to write something like, "today I went to this museum, then we ate at this cafe, then we missed this bus, etc." So, with that being said, I'm going to try to keep the posts fresh and full of funny stories.
For those of you who don't know, Splye and I are traveling in Europe over the next month. We will be spending the majority of our time in Krakow, Poland doing community service with a group called the AlfKlub. Around June 15, we're meeting up with All American Tom in Florence; then moving as a tripod to Switzerland, Germany and the Czech Republic. I've never travelled unsupervised in Europe, and I'm pumped to say the least. At the same time, I'm pretty unsure of what to expect. My only interaction with Poland has been The Wire Season 2 and a principal's office trip in fourth grade when I got in a heated argument with a Polish exchange student. At the AlfKlub we are going to be working with kids who are 7-17, teaching them conversational English and basically westernizing them. We're going on field trips with them and going to their homes and such. I think that a lot of funny shit is going to happen at work -- I can't really imagine how some of these young kids view America.
A few things that I've been thinking about leading up to the trip: what's the food like? Do they like Americans? Will I stop coughing after the trip? Am I going to be able to watch the rest of the NBA Playoffs? Was pole dancing invented in Poland? Am I in a highly stylized version of the Truman Show? I'll try to answer these questions throughout the blog...
I know the last question is pretty irrelevant, but it's certainly possible. I'll keep this post relatively short, nothing funny has happened yet. We leave tomorrow morning. I'm pretty much packed; I still gotta put some shit on my iPod but it ain't no thang.
As a semiprofessional hater, I know that there are going to be plenty of haters out there. Especially people who have already been abroad -- I'm sure you're going to say, "pshh, why do I need to read this? I've already been abroad, I've been to all the places he's talking about. MoneSplye is a stupid idiot anyway, I hate them for no reason!" To you, fellow haters, I would like to quote the great Mike Tyson and extend to you the following: just turn off the station.
See you mothafuckas in Europe...
-Ben
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